Arin’s Toss
Volmer

In which Theo is off to Liad sooner than expected.

It’s tempting to speculate, given the coincidence of the deadline, that the Uncle’s rush job has something to do with Korval’s departure from Liad. The trouble is, why would it be a rush job in that case? The Council gave Korval 144 days notice, which is tight for an established clan to gather up all its belongings but plenty of time for a nimble operator to line up a single courier.

Unless, perhaps, Volmer is so far from Liad that by the time news arrives of Korval’s expulsion, hot on the heels of the news of Solcintra being attacked, the 144 days are half over and there’s only just enough time for a courier to hotfot it back to Liad if they leave immediately.

The trouble with that is… well, there’s two problems:

One is that, if you break it down, that means it takes about 70 days for the news to travel from Liad to Volmer, and another 70 days for Theo to travel from Volmer to Liad. (The exact amounts are arguable – for one thing, the news probably travelled somewhat less urgently than Theo, so perhaps the split is more like 85-55 – but not enough to affect the point.) The point is, that means Theo’s dash from Volmer to Liad would last weeks without stopping for food or fuel. And since it’s specified that it consists of five Jumps, that means each Jump would be at least a week in itself. And that just doesn’t seem right.

The second problem is that we already know how far Volmer is from Liad, more or less, and it isn’t that far. We’re told in Agent of Change that Lufkit to Volmer is two days at a reasonable speed, and in Carpe Diem we learn that a suitably motivated pilot can go from Lufkit to Liad in another two days. Even at a comfortable amble – no, put it this way: even if the news travelled from Liad to Volmer by Clutch ship, and then Theo travelled from Volmer to Liad by Clutch ship, the entire round trip would take up only half of the 144 days.

Even if one throws up one’s hands and decides the Uncle’s rush job is just a coincidence, there’s still an issue, because Theo arrived on Volmer within twelve hours of the news that Liad had been attacked; are we to assume that Theo made the trip from Volmer to Liad in a few days in response to news that took months to travel the other direction? Well, perhaps we are; Shan does say in Conflict of Honors that news can take months to travel if it’s left to whoever happens to be going in the right direction instead of sent directly. And, after all, is there anyone on Liad who has any reason to send the news directly to Volmer? (Well, I expect the Uncle has someone keeping an eye on things there. But he could well have received the news quickly and decided to keep it to himself, leaving everyone else on Volmer to find out when the news arrived by a slower and more public channel.)

Tomorrow: Chapter 42 and I Dare Chapter 58. The order in which to read them is thereby left to pilot’s choice.